Identification of a circulating microRNAs biomarker panel for non-invasive diagnosis of coronary artery disease: case–control study

Abstract Background Circulating microRNAs (miRNAs) are considered a hot spot of research that can be employed for monitoring and/or diagnostic purposes in coronary artery disease (CAD). Since different disease features might be reflected on altered profiles or plasma miRNAs concentrations, a combination of miRNAs can provide more reliable non-invasive biomarkers for CAD. Subjects and methods We investigated a panel of 14-miRNAs selected using bioinformatics databases and current literature searching for miRNAs involved in CAD using quantitative real-time PCR technique in 73 CAD patients compared to 73 controls followed by function and pathway enrichment analysis for the 14-miRNAs. Results Our results revealed three out of the 14 circulating miRNAs understudy; miRNAs miR133a, miR155 and miR208a were downregulated. While 11 miRNAs were up-regulated in a descending order from highest fold change to lowest: miR-182, miR-145, miR-21, miR-126, miR-200b, miR-146A, miR-205, miR-135b, miR-196b, miR-140b and, miR-223. The ROC curve analysis indicated that miR-145, miR-182, miR-133a and, miR-205 were excellent biomarkers with the highest AUCs as biomarkers in CAD. All miRNAs under study except miR-208 revealed a statistically significant relation with dyslipidemia. MiR-126 and miR-155 showed significance with BMI grade, while only miR-133a showed significance with the obese patients in general. MiR-135b and miR-140b showed a significant correlation with the Wall Motion Severity Index. Pathway enrichment analysis for the miRNAS understudy revealed pathways relevant to the fatty acid biosynthesis, ECM-receptor interaction, proteoglycans in cancer, and adherens junction. Conclusion The results of this study identified a differentially expressed circulating miRNAs signature that can discriminate CAD patients from normal subjects. These results provide new insights into the significant role of miRNAs expression associated with CAD pathogenesis.